


The Low Road

by Wagontrain



Category: Fallout: New Vegas
Genre: Grief/Mourning, Horror, Legion Victory, M/M, Yuletide for People Who Didn't Sign Up for Yuletide
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-12-20
Updated: 2012-12-20
Packaged: 2017-11-21 16:10:07
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 3
Words: 16,982
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/599667
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Wagontrain/pseuds/Wagontrain
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Five years after the Legion's victory at Hoover Dam, the NCR asks the Courier to deliver a crate to Caesar.  He's offered a bag full of caps, and the one thing that has eluded him for years: a chance at getting even, no matter the cost.</p><p>Sequel to <a href="http://archiveofourown.org/series/17186">Messiah in Absentia</a> and a companion story to <a href="http://archiveofourown.org/series/33403">Steel Against Steel</a>.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. At the Wastelands of Madness

**Author's Note:**

  * For [thatfangirl](https://archiveofourown.org/users/thatfangirl/gifts).



The man across from Clint was NCR and desperately trying to hide it. Smart, given how poorly the Legion took to spies. He was also smart enough to know how deep in it he was, and still tried to carry out his mission. Clint decided he respected that.

“I’m looking for a courier,” the man said. 

Clint grunted and lifted a bottle to his lips. The whiskey burned his mouth, and he swallowed with a grimace. “Haven’t heard anyone call me that in a good few years now,” he commented, “but if you went to the effort to find me out here, it’s only right to hear you out.”

The man hadn’t given a name, but Clint had decided to call him California. Cali had pointedly ignored the squalor of Clint’s Novac apartment when he came in, and Clint felt his lip twitch in a smirk as Cali shifted in his seat, trying to avoid grime. “I have a package I need delivered to Hoover Dam. It’s a tribute for Caesar.” Maybe Cali wasn’t so smart; he pronounced the word _Sea-sar_ , and nobody in the Mojave said it that way since just after the Grand Clusterfuck.

He wasn’t going to fool anyone pretending what he was offering was ‘tribute.’ “You want me to deliver a bomb to Hoover Dam,” Clint drawled. “Is the NCR really that desperate? Wrote off the whole Dam?”

“I’m not…” Cali started, but stopped at Clint’s bored stare. “Fine. Have you heard news from the west?”

“Can’t say I have.”

“The Legion is pressing NCR hard. They’re headed for the ocean, and we can’t stop them. The Legion actually made a slave raid into Shady Sands itself a few months ago, just to show they could. Capital of the NCR and they were able to walk in, grab some citizens off the streets and walk back out before we could do anything.” Cali shuddered. “They’re not even calling it Caesar’s Legion anymore, it’s Lanius’ Legion. Caesar wanted land and glory, Legate Lanius just wants suffering and slaughter. He’s a monster.”

“Sounds like you could use that bomb of yours in California.”

Cali shook his head vigorously. “Matching the Legate force for force doesn’t work. We need to be strategic and threaten the Mojave, Caesar’s seat of power. That will force the Legate to split his army into something more manageable.”

All this talk made Clint thirsty, and he indulged himself with the bottle. “That’s a mighty optimistic outcome. Can’t say as that I think the Legate would give two shakes if the Dam and Caesar-” _Kai-sar_ “-both went to hell. But even if this idea of yours was a good one, the Mojave’s a big place, and the legionaries left behind to patrol it aren’t what you’d call the best. Just sneak the thing in.”

“It’s too big. Seven feet long, three tall, four wide or thereabouts. It’s going to need a caravan to move it, and there’s no such thing as a subtle caravan. It’s not a bomb. It’s something…more complicated. Found in the Boneyard sometime around the founding of the NCR, and kept just in case.”

“A doomsday weapon? So what do you need me for at all?”

“The weapon still needs to make it to the dam.” Cali looked Clint in the eye. “And rumor has it you’ve got Caesar’s favor. Could be useful.”

Clint felt his teeth grind. “That ain’t exactly something I’m keen on exercising.”

“Sure,” Cali shrugged dismissively. “You just keep watching it all go by. How many friends have you lost to the Legion? Your buddy from 1st Recon?”

“Mind yourself.”

Cali held up his hands. “Maybe you like living in Caesar’s Mojave. It’s certainly working for you.” He glanced around the shambles of a hotel room. “Look, I’ve got a sack of caps as big as you want for payment, but I don’t think that’s what will get you to do this. I think Caesar messed with you and you’ve just never been in a position to mess with him back.”

“You think an awful lot.” Cali didn’t answer that, and Clint stewed in silence for a good while.

“Any bits of advice for this little adventure?” he asked finally.

“Yes,” Cali said, his resolve faltering for just a moment. When he spoke again, he pitched his voice low. “Whatever you do, _don’t open the crate._ ”

*

Putting together a caravan took longer than Clint figured.

Ever since the Crimson Caravan went belly-up in a forgotten chapter of the Grand Clusterfuck -and good riddance- there’d been precious few people willing to risk their necks hauling packages. A couple guns for hire were easy enough to come by, a bit longer to weed out the morons and layabouts, and it took another few days to find a farmer willing to part with a couple of big horners.

They were a motley mix when they finally set out for what used to be Mojave Outpost; three mercenaries, Sandra who had come along to mind her family’s big horners, and a cook named Jim. Clint figured he was the most important member of the expedition; too many long, hungry days in the desert taught him to respect someone who could fix a good meal. The mercenaries were more of a mixed lot. The first one recruited had lied and said her name was Allison.

“I worked in one of the casinos, before the Grand Clusterfuck,” she’d said on the first night as they ate around the fire. “After the GC it seemed like a good idea to get the hell out of New Vegas.” Clint held his peace on that. He didn’t recognize her at all, and given that the Chairmen hadn’t allowed women he reckoned she’d either been one of the Omertas’ whores or had worn a mask for the White Glove Society. Both were equally anonymous to him.

Reese wanted desperately to be a badass. “This here’s the only thing I’ve ever loved,” he said, squatted on a log and checking the action of his rifle. “Only gun I’ve ever used, only gun I’ve ever needed.” Given another couple years Clint figured he’d actually get close to being as tough as he thought he was. Pity he was going to get shot in the back by the first man who got tired of his bravado. He’d do for now.

The last mercenary didn’t speak at all, and Clint had the sneaking suspicion that it was more due to a lack of tongue than a lack of will. The hash of scars across his back and thighs suggested he’d been subject to some centurion’s idea of discipline, and it wouldn’t be the first time Clint had heard of one of a Legion superior taking the most direct route to putting a stop to gossip and idle chit-chat. The man had a collection of knives and throwing spears that would have outfit a whole band of tribals. “You sure it’s a good idea to bring a Legion deserter along?” Allison demanded as the man laid out his spears next to the fire, checking their tips.

“Reckon if the Legion catches wind of what we’re doing, having one deserter around isn’t going to make a difference in how dead they want us.” Clint started calling the man Jack after that, in honor of his favorite drink. Jack never commented one way or another.

Clint had tried to decline the kind offer to bring Sandra along; he’d been around big horners long enough that he knew how to keep them going on his own and an extra person was an extra liability. She’d been insistent though: “These animals are all my family’s got. You paid caps to borrow them for a while, and I mean to see that they come back all right.” Turned out she was awful handy to have around in her own right, and so Clint didn’t see fit to fuss too much.

Jim tended the fire, stirred the beans, and kept pointedly to himself. “Business is business,” is all he would say.

The long horners were disinclined to move at anything approaching a swift pace, and with that it took three days to make their way to old Mojave Outpost. The gigantic figures of rangers clasping hands that had marked the settlement now rested at the foot of the hill, twisted and broken, staring blankly westward after the phalanxes of Caesar’s Legion that had departed through the pass.

Cali met them at the top of the hill. He had a cart with him, tucked in behind some of the ruins of Mojave Outpost. It looked like a coffin, and even though it sat in broad daylight Clint couldn’t shake the feeling that some sort of gloom clung to it. 

A bag of caps changed hands, and Cali gripped Clint’s hand, forcing their eyes to meet. The NCR man looked gaunt and drawn, his skin clammy despite the desert heat. “Do you remember what I told you?” he demanded. “Do you remember the most important thing?”

“Bring the crate to Hoover Dam. But you didn’t tell me what to do with it then.”

“Just leave it there. Leave it and run. And you must remember this, you must: _do not open the crate_!”

The man’s vehemence took Clint back. “Do you…will you want to meet again? To confirm delivery?”

Cali laughed at that, a wretched, horrible sound. “No. No, we’ll know if you succeed. The whole world will know if you succeed, God fucking help us all.” He shook his head, or twitched. Clint couldn’t be sure. “Is this better?” Cali whispered, staring intently at the crate. “Is this better than what the Legion would do to us? How can we save our souls if there’s no such thing as a soul? I’ve seen. _I know_.”

“Crazy as an outhouse rat,” Reese muttered, spitting on the dirt. 

“You best start walking west,” Clint said, brow knit with concern. Cali nodded, but if he was responding to the words or something else completely Clint couldn’t tell. To the others: “Get the cart hooked up to the big horners. I’m going to get a drink.”

“Always getting a drink,” Allison muttered.

The canteen was about the only building of Mojave Outpost left standing, and Clint made his way through the rubble. The bar was much as it had been, and a bottle of whisky sat just where he expected it.

_”Looking for trouble?”_

_“Just seeing the sights,” he answered. The woman slouched over a bottle and her eyes were hazy with booze and rage._

_“Well, keep those eyes up and turning…or I’ll set ‘em spinning. Got no time for gawkers.”_

_He snorted. “How about a drink?”_

_The woman glared at him, trying to figure out if he was making fun of her. Clint shrugged and signaled to the NCR stooge keeping bar. He downed his whisky quick and slapped the shotglass down next to the mess of glasses in front of the woman. “Drinking awful hard for just after dawn,” Clint said, signaling for another._

_“Drinking to forget,” she shot back. “Only gets me mad. Drinking used to cause me no end of trouble out west, ‘til I punched enough people and they learned to lay low when the whiskey hit.”_

_“Sounds like a familiar story,” Clint drawled, and stuck out his hand. “Clint.”_

_“Rose of Sharon Cassidy. Call me Cass…”_

The bar was empty and ruined again, and Clint shook his head. The bottle called to him, and he snatched it up and headed back outside. Old friends would have to wait until this delivery was finished.

*

They were alert as they headed back east from the Outpost, but nothing disturbed them. Not molerats, not radscorpions, not the beaten remains of the Powder Ganger breakout five years past. Once Clint spied a number of giant ants, but even they seemed to shy away from the caravan. Never seen one of their number go out of its way to avoid a fight before. Unnerving. 

“Head from Nipton to 95, take that north towards the Dam,” Allison said. “Looks like our best bet.”

Reese was lining up a shot through his scope on one of the ants, but jerked his head back at her comment. “You’re crazy. Even if we get past Nipton without running into any Legion, and we’re not gonna, we’ll never get up the length of 95 without getting spotted.”

“You got a better idea?” Allison shot back.

“Yeah, I do. Let’s take this thing off road. Take our chances going past Searchlight, get to the river and ford our way up.”

“Oh, so you know how to make a boat that can float that fucking thing?”

Reese’s grip tightened on his rifle, and Clint cleared his throat. “Searchlight’s flooded with radiation, son. I don’t fancy our chances of walking through that. And that cart’s going to be no good over broken ground.”

“ _I_ don’t fancy our chances of dealing with Legion patrols!”

“Certainly understandable. We’re just going to have to talk our way out. Use our heads instead of our guns.” 

_The last of the Great Khans lay in the dirt, sucking air through the cauterized hole Clint’s laser pistol blew through his chest._

_“Well,” Arcade said, watching the man die, “you certainly killed them all there.”_

_“The Khans should have known their days were numbered when they beat me and tried to put me in the ground,” Clint said lowly, holstering his pistol. “Now all that’s left is to find Benny and settle up with him, too.”_

_“About that.” Arcade glanced around. “How are you going to find him? The Khans are the only ones who knew where he went.”_

_“And they’ll tell me, just as soon as I…” Clint trailed off, staring down at the corpse in front of him. “Well…that is a bit of a conundrum.”_

_Arcade sighed. “Right. You’re a smart man, Clint, but you’re going to cause no end of problems if you keep thinking with your gun instead of your brain…”_

“I hope you’ve got a great goddamn head,” Reese groused, taking a potshot at an ant. One of its legs separated messily from its body and the beasty squealed, but kept its distance. Damned unnerving.

*

It was getting on towards dusk as they reached Nipton. The Legion was proud of that conquest; both their first major victory on the west bank of the river, and the last holdout of NCR’s rearguard as they fled the Mojave. NCR’s propaganda would have folks believe that it had been an orderly tactical withdrawal, but Clint remembered anything but.

_“Got more of them here than I’ve got fists!” Veronica shouted, swinging a crushing blow into one of the frenzied initiates Legate Lanius sent against them. Bullets sparked off her power armor and thudded into the initiates trying to drag her down, but Veronica was unfazed. “Clint! Look west! The NCR!”_

_Clint’s laser rifle was hot in his hands, and the drained cells around him had scorched the ground. He spared a look behind him to see what had her attention and snarled. The NCR troopers had broken completely, running scared towards Mojave Outpost. “Yellow sons of bitches,” Clint breathed. “We’re done. This place is lost, we’re getting out of here. Split up, we’ll meet back in Primm.” Lily shimmered into invisibility and Raul cracked off a few shots before breaking cover and making a run for it. Veronica casually backhanded a man to death before starting her own retreat. Only Boone held his ground._

_“Boone! We’re fucked, we need to go!”_

_Boone’s rifle cracked, and a decanus died with a bullet in his head. “I’m good,” Boone answered. “You go. I’ll keep them busy.” He fired again and this time a centurion crumpled, from far enough away that Clint had to squint to make out his feathered helmet._

_Clint nodded. “Good knowing you, Boone.”_

_Another decanus died. “Same to you.” And another._

_Clint ran._

The Legion was proud of that conquest, and had made an example of it. As they entered town the caravan passed row after row after row of crucifixes, most with nothing more than a few bones left nailed to the wood but a few fresher bodies hung at the end of each line. 

One crucifix stood on its own, the distinction being the most honor the Legion could offer to any profligate. The body was long gone, ruined by Legion abuse or worrying by scavengers, but a single red beret nailed to the head of the cross gave hint to the identity of the man the Legion grudgingly paid its respects to.

“The last hurrah of the Grand Clusterfuck,” Sandra muttered, glancing around the ravaged town.

“Can’t say as that I’d like to sleep here,” Jim said. “Angry ghosts ‘round here. Don’t blame them.”

Clint shook himself. “Can’t say I do either. There’s a place close by. In the open, but we’ll make due.”

The drive-in was empty, aside from the ruined satellite endlessly shifting its bent solar panel. They made camp nearby, under the movie screen. Jim set about starting supper, and Clint assigned watch shift between himself, Allison, Jack and Reese. Sandra let the big horners roam a bit, whispering reassurances and stroking their coats in turn.

Darkness fell with indecent haste, as if the sun was looking to get as far away as quick as possible. Clint collected rocks for a firepit by the light of his Pip-Boy, and by the time he’d built up the ring Reese had found enough branches and brush to make a respectable fire.

“So where are you all from?” Sandra asked, settling on a log at the fire’s edge.

“Westside,” Reese answered. “Helping run protection for Pretty Sarah’s girls.” He seated himself next to Sandra, probably closer than necessary. “Never _any_ problems when I was on duty.”

Sandra tittered at his presumption. “How about you, Jim?”

“North,” was all he answered. Sandra turned to Jack to ask him, but thought better of it.

“Fancy clothes like those Clint, I expect you’re from some place ritzy,” she said.

“Came up in New Reno,” he rumbled. “Not a good place for a kid, or an adult. Someday I’ll go back.” Something in his tone spoke of malice and untoward intent.

Jim passed around bowls of corn mash, and stepped out to bring Allison hers where she stood guard. Reese and Sandra flirted and Clint tuned them out, staring at the crashed satellite. He’d spent a long couple of days in this drive-in a few years ago, delirious and hallucinating after catching the losing end of a tussle with a bark scorpion and a leg full of venom. He recalled fragments; a bizarre landscape of metal trees and hexagonal pillars, booming voices and more scorpions, metal this time with lasers in their tails. He never felt quite the same after that; his chest and back felt tight in a way he’d never been able to work out.

A cry from Reese brought Clint’s attention back to the here and now in time to see the younger man upend his bowl into the dirt. “What the hell Jim? You put fucking maggots in my food?” Jim peered suspiciously at the mess, then up at Reese with a quirked eyebrow. 

“Can’t say at that I see any squirming in there,” Clint opined. Reese was on his feet, looking bewildered.

“I swear, they were right there, wriggling in the mash…fucking dozens of them.” Jim looked sidelong to Clint, who acknowledged it with a small shrug. The boy was young enough to think he was invulnerable, could be he’d gotten himself in on some chems or tribal junk. Things could stick with you long after they were supposed to have worn off.

“Here,” Jim offered a second bowl gruffly. Reese accepted it and tried not to be obvious about checking it for bugs.

Before too long Jack took the watch from Allison, and everyone else bedded down. Clint laid out his roll next to the fire pit, as far as he could be from the cart while still keeping some of the fire’s dying warmth. Reese and Sandra took to bed together, and it wasn’t long after that Clint found himself staring up at the stars, trying to ignore the sounds of the two of them awkwardly making love. One of the stars overhead moved slowly, a dim blue glow against a field of white pinpricks. What it was, Clint had no idea; another bit of weirdness hovering over a world already full of it.

The satellite hummed to life, its projector shining a beam of light onto the drive-in’s giant screen; a skittering human eye, eerily silent and watching. Resigning himself to another night of dream terrors, Clint let sleep take him.

*

What woke him at first was the _cold_.

Clint wasn’t new to the ways of the desert by any means; he knew that as hot it was in the day, it would become cold at night. This was different though. This cold seeped into his bones, setting his hands shivering and clawing at his very soul. Clint wrapped his arms around himself and tucked his knees to his chest, trying to fight off the preternatural chill to no avail. 

A low sound caught his ears, and Clint felt his heart skip a beat. It was a wet noise, but with an undertone of rough scraping and what horrifyingly might have been a low sigh. Clint tried to match the sound to anything he knew from the Mojave, and the options restarted his heart and set it racing. Too far east for deathstalkers. Ghouls up from Searchlight? Nightkin?

With frigid fingers Clint found the pistol at his hip and drew it. The coils on along the recharger pistol glowed sickly green as he rolled to his feet, squinting into the gloom all around. Allison was already sitting up, shotgun in her hands and her face pale with fear. Knowing that she was as scared as he was didn’t help at all. He nodded to her and rose to his feet, casting about for what made the sound. Allison shook Reese’s bedroll, catching Sandra but waking both of them. In a few moments the three of them stood, weapons raised and shivering in the cold.

“Where’s Jack?” Reese hissed. 

“Supposed to be on guard,” Allison whispered back fiercely. Clint opened his mouth to answer but the noise came again and this time he realized it came from the far side of the crate. 

Reese was wide-eyed. “What is _in_ that box?” 

Clint tightened his grip on his pistol. “You two. Flank around to the right. I’ll flank left. _Quietly_.” He picked his way forward, avoiding loose rocks and deadwood as best he could. He checked Reese and Allison’s position when he reached the side of the cart, and with a nod swung around the edge of the cart, pistol ready.

Jack sat cross-legged on the ground, facing the cart. “Jack? What’s going on?” Clint couldn’t make out detail in the darkness, but he could see as Jack picked up one of the spears laid out beside him. The deserter held it in both hands, slowly turning it so the point nestled just under his ribcage, pointed almost straight down. With one excruciatingly slow motion he impaled himself, pushing the spear through his guts and giving one final shove to seat the speartip in to the ground. With quaking fingers Clint found the toggle for his Pip-Boy’s light and cast it at Jack. The man’s belly was a pincushion, the hilts of half a dozen throwing spears protruding. Jack’s tongueless mouth hung open, and even though they were blank and dead his eyes found Clint’s. His quiet deathrattle was obscured by Reese noisily emptying his dinner on the ground for a second time.

“What is this?” Allison demanded, her shotgun shaking in her hand. “ _What the hell is this?_ ”

Clint shook his head slowly. “Wish I knew.”

*

No one quite had the will to get close enough to Jack’s corpse to bury him, so they ended up leaving him there, pinned to the ground. Abandoning Jack like that stuck in Clint’s craw, but the memory of those blank eyes haunted him more than the disrespect shown to a man he barely knew. They struck camp at the earliest light of dawn, and it wasn’t until they were almost ready to move out that Clint realized Reese was nowhere to be found. Sandra timidly explained that he’d run off an hour before, intent to get himself as far from the corpse and the crate as he could. Clint couldn’t decide if the boy was craven or sensible.

“I say we throw the damn thing into the river,” Allison said after they’d been walking a good while. The big horner’s pace was faster than it had been yesterday, as if they were trying to get away from their burden. Clint understood the feeling. 

“We’ve got a delivery to make,” he replied evenly. “You want to follow Reese, you go right ahead.”

“Enough, the two of you,” Jim broke in, pointing north along the road. “Trouble.” Three men walked towards them, flanked by roaming mongrels. 

“Legion,” Allison muttered, reaching for her weapon.

“Hold on now,” Clint shook his head. “We’re playing this straight. We start shooting now, we’ll never make it to the Dam in one piece.” She didn’t like that, but let her hand drop.

It was a tense couple of minutes as the two groups approached each other, and it was a relief to be able to break the awkward silence. “Hail Caesar,” Clint shouted across the distance.

“Hail Caesar,” came the reply. “What’s your business?”

The legionaries approached the caravan, examining the cart and the women. Allison bristled and Sandra shied away from their leers. “A tribute, for Caesar from the Sorrows tribe,” Clint lied. Chances that these legionaries had even heard of the Sorrows, let alone knew that they lived north of the Mojave rather than the direction the caravan was coming from, were slim. “They wish to curry favor with the Legion, in hopes of joining.”

“I will see this tribute,” the legionary with the most impressive armor said. 

“I was asked to deliver the tribute unmolested.” The legionary stirred; it had been some time since anyone had the gall to tell him no. Clint reached into his pocket and produced a coin hung from a leather thong, an image of a running bull and some Latin words along the bottom: ‘Libertas inaestimabilis res est.’ The legionary squinted at it, then laughed.

“We are in the presence of greatness,” he called to his companions. “Here stands the Courier, favored of Caesar. These Sorrows were wise to select you as their errand boy.” He stepped aside, waving them through with a theatrical gesture. “I’m sure Caesar will be delighted to see you again, Courier.” Clint nodded with ill grace, motioning at Sandra to get the big horners moving again. 

“What was that?” Allison demanded once they had left the legionaries behind. “’Favored of Caesar?’”

“I never helped Caesar,” Clint answered evenly, his eyes determinedly on the road ahead. “After things went to hell with the Grand Clusterfuck my reputation preceded me. Caesar decided he’d rather not make an enemy of me.”

“You’re full of shit.”

_“You’ve got the ear of a lot of important people in the Mojave,” Arcade said, pulling his shirt on. “You could do a lot of good here with the Followers. A lot of what is going to happen in the next couple days is going to come down what you do.”_

_Clint snorted, reaching for his trusty Vault 13 flask on the bedside table and the whiskey inside. “You talk about that like it’s a good thing.”_

_“I think it is. You’re a smart man. Imagine what you could do for the Mojave if you put your head to it.”_

_“I’ve lived my life by one rule, Arcade. Somebody messes with you, you let them know they don’t do that. And if they live, maybe you all can make up. Mighty poor way to run a society…”_

“You’ve got no idea, lady,” Clint shook himself free of memory. “You want to hate me, that’s your right. You’ve got more cause than you know. But save it for after we make this delivery.”

*

The caravan made it a bit past Novac and Clint had some hope that they’d be able to make it to the Dam by nightfall, but they didn’t get too far past Novac when a sandstorm kicked up. The big horners dug in their hooves and refused to move forward. Reluctantly they made camp, huddling against the big horners to block the wind. Jim passed around packs of Fancy Lad snack cakes and they ate in silence.

“So what do you think is in it?” Sandra asked at length, glancing longwise at the cart.

“More trouble than we’re getting paid for,” Allison grumbled. 

“Best not to think about it,” Jim agreed. 

Truth be told Clint had the same question, but no courier lasted very long if they went poking around with their employer’s packages. He suspected that would be doubly true in this case. 

Allison finished her snack cake and glared at the wrapper as if it had offended her. “Got any more? This just ain’t filling.”

“I break out the cooking gear and half of what you eat is going to be sand,” Jim answered.

“This isn’t good,” she grumbled. “I want some real food. It’s been so damn long since I’ve had real food.”

“We just had corn mash last night,” Sandra said, rising to her feet and breaking out the feed for the big horners.

“Nature’s calling,” Clint said by way of excusing himself. He pulled his ratty, wide-brimmed hat down to block some of the sand and walked a good distance away from the caravan. With his back to the sandstorm he opened his pants and relieved himself. It was a rare moment of peace, and Clint decided he’d be damn pleased to have the damned crate delivered and away.

A scream cut through the howl of the sandstorm, and Clint swore viciously. He fixed his pants and set back to the caravan at a run, recharger pistol drawn. The big horners roared, fear and anger in their voices as they bucked hard against the harnesses keeping them with the cart. With a great crack the arms of the cart gave way and the big horners broke, charging off into the storm. Clint’s profanity became downright uncivilized, but what he saw before him stopped him cold. 

Allison knelt on Jim’s body, hacking away at his thigh with her knife. She came away with a hunk of meat, dripping and warm and before Clint could say a word she bit into it deeply. A sound of satisfaction rumbled in her throat. “So _good_.” Clint gagged and she looked up him sharply. “ _More_.”

Allison lurched forward at him and Clint jerked the recharger pistol level with her face and fired. 

He stood there for a long moment, her corpse crumpled at his feet with a hole burned cleanly through her right eye. “Reckon you didn’t work at Gammorah,” he gasped.

Sandra sat a few feet away, clutching her knees to her chest and rocking back and forth. “She was _eating_ him,” she whispered. “ _Eating him._ They were talking, then she was just _eating him_. What is in that box? She wouldn’t have done that on her own. _What is in there_?!”

“I’ve had enough of this,” Clint snarled. The damned crate was still in its place on the cart, and Clint moved behind and pushed with all his strength. It budged, just a little, he turned back to Sandra. “Help me!”

She looked up at him, eyes full of disbelief. “What is happening? It’s just a delivery! _What’s in that box_?” 

He gave up on her at that, leaning into the cart. It was mostly flat road and he was able to slow going of it. It should have been impossible, he knew. The cart had to weigh a hundred pounds, let alone the crate _and whatever was in it_ , but he met its inertia with the frenzied energy of a madman. Windblown sand whipped against his face, and he pushed on. The sun hid once again from the terror of his cargo, and he pushed on. 

It was the uneven, broken pavement that proved to him in the end. One of the wheels slipped over the ruined surface and with a _crack_ the axel gave way, tilting the cart to the side and spilling the crate over and onto the ground. The wood of the crate splinted, and Clint froze. Just past the splinters he saw for the first time the object he’d been transporting. A metal casket, the exact dimensions of a coffin. “Is it mine?” he asked, eyes wild. “Have I been carrying my own damn coffin?” He set at the remains of the crate with a fury, pulling planks of wood away and not noticing or caring about the deep gouges he cut into his palms in the doing. 

He finally broke apart the last of the crate, panting over it. Fear took him; apprehension at violating one of the oldest rules of being a courier, yes, but more the creeping terror that lay between the unknown and what was known all too well. He clawed at the clasps, desperate for understanding or madness or both and finally with a triumphant cry threw back the lid.

Clint stared at the contents of the casket.

The contents of the casket stared back at Clint.

The only sensation was the ground rising up to meet him, the only sound his pounding heart. He scrambled backwards, now in knowing desperate to escape and aware that it was too late for him and too late for everyone. One gnarled hand rose above the lip of the casket, black in color with decay and mutation, and fingers wrapped around the edge. It levered itself upright, wavering on spindly legs like a thing only learning how to walk and all the more horrifying for it. It turned its head, gazing down at Clint with a lidless gaze of apathy and malevolence. 

And then it spoke.


	2. Lex Talionis

_”You ever get the deets?”_

_Clint glanced up at the stars overhead. “Now what would bring you to ask such a question?”_

_Cass shrugged. The silence stretched for a long moment, before she worked up the will to speak again. “There was somebody,” she said, “somebody special, not a dirty cuss like you.”_

_Clint snorted at that. “And that somebody special didn’t care much for your drinking?”_

_“I’ll be the first to admit that it’s gotten me into a number of situations,” Cass allowed. “And I thought to myself, ‘what the hell. I can stop any time I want.’”_

_The ground was hard under him, and Clint stretched out on his bed roll. “How’d that go?”_

_“First couple days were hell. Sick like I’d been taking a bath in rad water, thought I was gonna die for a while.” Cass rolled over, looked hard at Clint. “Never told anybody this part. Promise you’ll keep it to yourself?”_

_“Of course.”_

_“Even Arcade. Who knows what he’d think.” Clint nodded, and Cass took a deep breath. “After six days of not drinking, after the headaches and the puking and the shakes…Clint, I swear I saw my father. Just as plain as I’m seeing you now.”_

_“Isn’t your father dead?”_

_“Dead, missing then dead, whatever. I hadn’t seen him for twenty years.”_

_“So what’d you do?”_

_Cass laughed, short and ugly. “What the hell do you think I did? I started drinking again. No special somebody is worth that.”_

_“Touching story,” Clint rumbled. A long day of walking the wastes wore at him, and he could feel sleep tugging at his eyelids._

_“It got me thinking. How would I know if I just lost it? Flipped my lid and went crazy-like.”_

_Clint laughed out loud at that. “Now who’s been telling you you’re crazy? Raul? Reckon he thinks all of us are crazy.”_

_“I’m serious, Clint.” Cass scowled. There’s a lot of weird shit going on in the wastes. How would I know if I’d plain lost my mind, or if it was just another day in the Mojave?”_

Clint’s eyes shot open with a start. The ground against his back was hard, but it was sun in the sky over his head, not stars. Cass was nowhere in sight, though she hadn’t been for quite some time.

The image of the _thing_ rising out of its coffin came back to him, and Clint sat up with his laser pistol in his hand. The ruined cart and its open cargo lay a dozen paces away, and he kept a wary eye on it as he found his feet again. “Out for a while,” he murmured. “But where…” _is it_? He finished in his mind, too afraid to give voice to it, as it speaking about it might summon it back to him. Heart hammering against his chest, he crept towards the cast, pistol leading the way.

“It’s gone,” a voice said, and Clint wheeled at the sound, pistol level at the speaker’s chest. The man’s eyes widened with surprise, framed behind thick glasses, and Clint’s aim wavered as he recognized the soiled white lab coat.

“ _Arcade_?” he gaped. “But how…what are you doing out here?”

Arcade gently pushed the barrel of the pistol aside, clearing his throat nervously. “Never pulled a _gun_ on me before, Clint,” he said. “I heard you might be in trouble, thought I might be of some help.”

“I’d welcome anything you have to offer.” Clint holstered the pistol. “Did you see where it went? Did you see… _what_ it is?”

He was quaking, and Arcade took him by the shoulder. “Sit down, you look…you look horrible.”

“I didn’t know what it was,” Clint muttered. “Seen a lot of things in the Mojave, but that thing…it looked through me, and it just didn’t care. Like I was a bit of sand.”

“Okay,” Arcade soothed. “It’s okay.” Practiced fingers found Clint’s pulse, checked him over for injuries. “What did it do to you?”

The image of the thing’s baleful gaze bore into him, and Clint choked out “It _spoke_ to me.”

“And…” Arcade frowned, trying to work out the missing piece between communication and the utter terror of his companion. “…what did it say?”

“It said…” Clint shivered. The words were just at the edge of his memory, and suddenly they surrounded him, crushing him with their terrible truth. With a cry, Clint passed out again.

*

It was nearly nightfall before Clint came to himself again.

Arcade sat nearby, tending a fire built from the remains of the cart. Clint rolled over, noticing for the first time the bandages wrapped around his hands.

“Looks like you cut yourself up pretty good on the cart there,” Arcade commented. It was a comment waiting for an explanation. Clint always hated it when Arcade did that.

“Had to make a delivery.”

“Of the…the thing?” Arcade pressed.

“Man from California paid me a lot of money to get it to the Dam. Figured it for a weapon of some sort, not a…”

“Not a person?”

“That wasn’t no person.” Clint shivered. “You said it was gone. Where to?”

Arcade poked the fired with a log, sending sparks flying. “Saw it walking away as I was approaching. Walked on two legs. Head, two arms…”

“It _wasn’t_ no person,” hissed Clint, spitting on the ground. “I saw it too, and what I saw…”

“All right, all right. Don’t want you passing out again.” Clint scowled at that, but didn’t argue. “It was headed north. Probably to New Vegas, what’s left of it. Let the Legion deal with it.” 

“Don’t rightly think they can.” Clint pulled himself to his feet, casting about for his wide-brimmed hat. He couldn’t shake the unsettled feeling, the sensation that what previously had been down was now more than a bit sideways. Putting the hat on made him feel a bit better, though not overmuch. “That’s going to have to be up to us.”

“Up to…” Arcade gaped. “You’re serious. Whatever that thing is, it _talked_ to you and you blacked out for hours. _Thinking_ about it talking to you put you out again. And you want to go after it?”

“It unmanned me,” Clint said lowly. “Tried to make me afraid.”

Arcade muttered under his breath. “’Tried.’”

Clint ignored him. “No one does that. Not without retribution.”

“Oh, yes. It hurt you, so you’re going to hurt it back. That’s worked so well.”

“Ain’t in the mood for your jabs.” Clint patted down his coat’s pockets. Weapons in place, maps folded and neat, coin secreted away in the hidden spots in the lining. “If you’re coming, then come. Otherwise, thank you for watching over me and goodbye.”

“Don’t be like that,” Arcade rose, kicking dirt into the fire. “You know I’m coming. But seriously, has ‘retribution’ ever worked out well for you?”

_”Now that you and me’s got some privacy, I’ve gotta ask; how is it that you’re still living?”_

_Benny leaned against the bar, his white and black checkered suit making Clint’s eyes hurt as he moved. “Not looking at giving up trade secrets, Benny.”_

_“So is that the way the wind is going to blow?” The Chairman sighed. “You’ve got a crazy drop on me here, baby, that’s for sure. But there’s gotta be something more you’re…?” Clint’s fist caught him square on the nose, sending Benny flying to the floor. Clint was after him in an instant, wrestling the gun out of Benny’s hand and tossing it across the room. Benny looked up at him from the floor, blood streaming from his busted nose. “Then this is endsville, huh? Well, may the best man win.”_

_He was a smooth talker, but if Benny ever knew how to fight he’d forgotten it a long time ago. The Chairman tried to dodge the first swing or two, but it was only a few moments before Clint had him down, raining blows on his head. His hands were slick with blood, and he grabbed at the checkered lapels, hauling Benny up off the floor._

_“Must seem like an eighteen-carat run of bad luck,” Clint snarled, mocking. “Truth is, Benny? You know the truth?”_

_Benny sputtered through broken teeth. “Damn game was rigged from the start.”_

_“Yeah.” Clint let Benny drop again. He found the Chairman’s pistol under the table, a shrouded woman painted onto the grip._

_“Wait,” Benny held up a hand, begging. “Tell House-”_

_“Fuck House,” Clint fired, once, and Benny’s brains splashed against the bar._

_Clint made his way back downstairs, Benny’s pistol stashed under his coat. He caught Boone’s eye across the casino. The soldier nodded and made his way to the front door. Clint bellied up to the bar and raised two fingers for a glass of whiskey. Not many of the people he ran with these days would understand, but Boone and Cass…they knew._

_Out of the corner of his eye Clint saw Boone push back inside, Cass right behind him. Both of them had rifles in their hands, and the Chairman bouncer was already heading to talk to them._

_“Ten caps there, buddy,” the bartender said._

_Clint smirked and drew Benny’s pistol, drilling a hole through the man. “Bullet’s probably worth more.” Chaos erupted; gamblers running for cover, Chairman screaming and pulling out their own guns. Clint just smiled, watching as Boone and Cass leveled their rifles at the Chairmen’s backs._

“Somebody tries to kill me, I kill them right back,” Clint said. “Let’s go.”

*

They moved as fast as they could in the dark, picking their way around broken terrain. To the north Clint could just make out the broken spire of the Lucky 38 against the night’s sky. 

“I don’t hear screaming,” Arcade commented hopefully. “That’s a good sign, right?”

Clint held his peace. The terrain here was familiar, in a way he couldn’t quite up his finger on. “I think we’ve been here before.”

“We’ve been everywhere in the Mojave,” Arcade muttered.

_”This ain’t right,” Cass said, looking out over the caravan wreckage._

_“No, it ain’t.” Clint kept his own eyes on the horizon, ignoring the trails of wetness staining Cass’ cheeks. Seemed only polite. “But at least it looks like it was quick. Raiders aren’t usually that.”_

_“That’s what I’m talking about.” Cass pointed at the black marks scorched into the brahmin’s bodies. “These are energy weapon burns. All of them. I don’t see bullet holes anywhere. Raiders don’t_ got _this many laser pistols and plasma rifles. This wasn’t random.”_

_“Somebody attacked your people. Getting at you.”_

_“Yeah. Somebody. Somebody who’s gonna pay.”_

“Oh,” Arcade said, glancing around. “Cassidy Caravan, right? This is where you two found out about the attacks.”

“It is.”

“I think about that sometimes,” Arcade mused. “How that might have, well, gone different.”

“You think a lot,” Clint answered quietly. 

“You used to say you liked that. Something about how I gave you level-headed advice.”

“You and me ain’t now like we were,” Clint said. Arcade looked longways at him, but Clint refused to meet his gaze. “I’m not rightly sure how you’re here at all.” 

“Being your conscience, as usual.” Arcade shrugged. 

“Gnat’s buzzin’.”

That brought Arcade up short. “Is that what you think of me? Of Veronica? Of people who don’t jump straight to violence as the solution to all of their problems?”

“Some people need killin’. That ain’t gonna change.”

“Not as long as people like you are willing to pull the trigger!”

Conversation was over when Arcade hit that tone, Clint knew. He tried a different topic. “I’ve got nothing but respect for Veronica.”

He could see an angry _but not for me_ in Arcade’s eyes, but the other man allowed the conversation to turn. “Veronica was an optimist. Hardly seems your type.”

Clint shrugged. “Reckon Veronica had it worse than most of us in her bunker. Not starving or getting rad sick or getting shot at. Different.” Arcade looked at him questioningly. Clint hated that look. “Me, I never had a family I didn’t pick myself. And I’d never have none who wouldn’t take me for who I am. Veronica didn’t have that. She was born into a family that’d cast aspersions on her for who she fell in love with. Chased her partner off on some damn fool quest, all the way to the Sierra Madre. That sort of thing wears at a person, just a little bit day after day. She stuck with the Brotherhood and their scorn for something. Love maybe.”

“Whereas you’d end that scorn with a bullet,” Arcade scoffed.

“Two ways to get through the world. Respect and fear.” Clint shrugged. “People who ain’t got one need to have the other.”

“And so the cycle turns.”

They walked for a distance in silence, picking their way across the sands. “I’m sorry,” Clint said eventually. 

“We’ve never seen eye to eye on a lot of things,” Arcade sighed. “I just wish you could _see_. What’s all this revenge get you? What did it get Boone, or Cass?”

“Some things just need doing. Wouldn’t expect you to understand.”

*

It was well after dawn before Clint and Arcade reached the outskirts of New Vegas. “It’s _quiet_ ,” Arcade murmured.

“Well, you were all fired up about the lack of screaming previously,” Clint shot back.

“And now I’m wondering if that was a good idea.” Arcade eyed the low ramparts surrounding the city. “Sure the Legion doesn’t approve of the gambling and whoring that made the Strip the vibrant place it was, but…even they made some noise. Laughing at profligates hanging from crosses, the screaming of slaves. You know, normal Legion noises.”

Clint drew his recharger pistol. He hadn’t been this close to New Vegas in years, and certainly not without being challenged. The Legion was made up of idiots who wouldn’t know common sense if it shook their hands, but Caesar and the Legate understood that New Vegas was too important a location not to fortify. 

They crept in through the Freeside gate. The Legion hadn’t been gentle in their occupation; the King’s School of Impersonation had been burned to the ground for offering the Legion the meager resistance they found when they arrived, and the street in front of the Atomic Wrangler was littered with a mess of steel crosses, crudely driven through the asphalt. The Legion suffered no profligates. Beyond them Clint could see the empty storefront of the Silver Rush.

_”I say we take out the guards at the door quietly, then just keep rolling grenades inside until the Van Graffs are done for.”_

_Cass shook her head, eyeing the door. “No. Jean-Baptiste is gonna see this coming, and Gloria…she’s gonna die by inches. You ready?”_

_Clint checked the charge on his laser rifle. “Of course.”_

They turned away, towards the Strip itself. The Legion had murdered and enslaved the people of New Vegas, but they’d also done something darker and more horrible; they’d taken its soul. All the gaudy lights, the bustle, the illicit excitement of the place had died once the Legion arrived. The Kings and the few remaining Securitrons had fought hard when the Legion rolled in, but after the Grand Clusterfuck there had hardly been anyone left to raise a gun, let alone organize a resistance. 

The massive gate leading to the Strip stood unguarded, destroyed Securitrons flanking the entrance. As Clint pushed through he could finally hear a noise; almost a groaning, constant and low. Arcade gave a worried look and Clint pushed through, rushing to cover behind a low park bench. The ruin of the Lucky 38’s tower lay where it had fallen when Caesar ordered it pulled down, smashed into the remains of Gomorrah.

“It took four hundred slaves a week to do that,” Arcade commented. “Caesar does like his symbolism, doesn’t he?”

They made their way around the wreckage, and Clint peered around the Lucky 38’s broken spire. It looked like _everyone_ in New Vegas, Legion and slaves alike knelt on the hard asphalt of the plaza before the gate leading deeper into the Strip. Above them stood -hovered- the thing. “ _She’s_ what scared you so bad?” Arcade asked incredulously. Clint only squinted at her, trying to understand. The blacked, mutated form was gone; instead it looked for all the world like a woman, fair of skin with dark hair cropped close and wearing ragged clothes that wouldn’t have been out of place on any Wastelander in the Mojave. But there was a _wrongness_ to her that Clint couldn’t quite put his finger on, something darker and more terrifying than the fact that she refused to touch the ground.

“We’ve got to figure out how it’s doing this,” Arcade breathed. “Some kind of mind control, yes, but…how? It’s only been here a few hours.”

“I’ll bring you the corpse if that’ll help you figure it out,” Clint intoned, lining his pistol’s sights on the thing’s head.

Arcade gaped. “Are you _crazy_ -?” he got out before Clint pulled the trigger. The blast crossed the distance in an instant and just _stopped_ dead in the air inches from hitting it. The thing rolled its head, examining the shaft of light where it hung in the air. “That’s…not possible,” breathed Arcade.

“Another little thing.”

Clint spun in place, reflexively firing several shots at the thing now standing right behind them. The thing waved the energy away and the recharger pistol drifted apart in Clint’s hand, its pieces falling to the ground. “Well…damn.”

“Why are you not of us?” It leaned in close, peering at Clint as if it were trying to remember how to focus her eyes. Clint held his ground, but barely; the thing radiated cold. “Oh,” it cooed, touching a finger to his forehead, to the scar Benny had left him. “You’re broken. You’re a broken little thing, aren’t you? Bits of metal in your brain.”

“Then why…?” Arcade’s curiosity moved faster than his sense to stay quiet, and the thing turned its gaze on him. “Er. Um. I mean, I wasn’t…shot in the head. Why aren’t I…one of you?” It looked him over top to bottom, and sneered.

“The buzzing of a gnat.” Clint felt his bowels clench as it turned back to him. “We know you. You were there when we woke.” It wasn’t a question, but Clint felt himself nodding in agreement anyway. “Little things shatter at the sight of us. You are already broken and only broke a little. It has been effortful to limit ourselves to your perceptions. Where is the casino?”

“The…?” Clint glanced around, confused. “Most were destroyed. By the Legion. Gomorrah and the Lucky 38 here, the Tops and-”

“No!” It screamed, and Clint flinched at the sound. “The _casino_ , Clint! Home! There are ghosts here, but they’re _wrong_ , they’re hollow and only _think_ they’re dead, they’re…” It trailed off, and Clint realized that the expression on its face -on her face- was fear.

“What’s your name?” Arcade asked softly.

“Yes. Lucy,” she answered, speaking to Clint. “For now.”

Arcade shot a look to Clint, something to the effect of _tread lightly_. Clint scowled at him, but nodded. “Do you remember how you got here?”

“I was and I am,” was her only answer. 

“All right then,” he said. Her gaze was unfocused again, and she’d begun murmuring to herself. “Would you mind if I talk with Arcade?” Lucy didn’t answer, and Clint pulled the other man aside. “I’d welcome any genius ideas you might have to shed light on this here situation.”

Arcade shook his head, peering over Clint’s shoulder at her. “I’ve…I have no idea. She doesn’t seem to be constrained by things like physics or reality. And she seems to perceive things…differently.”

“She’s crazy.”

“That might be an appropriate colloquialism,” Arcade allowed. He squinted. “She’s counting. I think she’s counting air molecules.”

“You said there are other casinos here,” Lucy interrupted. “Show me, Clint. Maybe they’re the right one.” Clint shivered at her attention, but nodded. Simple enough request.

“All right. This way.” Clint started towards the gates, trying desperately to keep Lucy in view. The mass of Legion and slaves still knelt in the way, bodies too thick to move through. Before he said anything they rose as one, stepping back to clear a path. “What did you do to these people?”

“We have unified. Their minds became as mine when I neared them.”

Arcade waved a hand in front of a slave’s eyes, though he didn’t so much as blink. “Are they still…them? Are they in there?”

“They are we,” Lucy replied. Clint pushed open the massive gate, and she glided through. “The master race. The Master’s race. One race! One goal!” She glanced at the Tops. “That’s not home. The chips are wrong, I can hear them from here.”

“The Ultralux is a bit further down,” Clint said carefully. Lucy’s enthralled mass followed them closely, still humming lowly. “Maybe the chips will sound…different?”

Lucy _screamed_ , and the sound penetrated into Clint’s very brain. “ _What is that_?” He followed the direction she was pointing; the ruined sign announcing the abandoned Vault 21.

“It’s just a hotel,” Clint said, taking an involuntary step back. “Least it was, before the Legion showed up. Now it’s just a hole in the ground. Nothing…nothing to get upset over.”

Lucy turned on the mass of people behind her. “She’s _here_. Where are you, Vault Dweller? _Where_?!” Clint could feel emotion roiling off of her now, a visceral hatred that permeated his skin and embedded itself into his mind. Slowly the crowd parted, an emptiness forming around one of the slaves. 

“Oh my God,” Arcade said. “It’s Sarah, Sarah Weintraub. She ran the Vault 21 Hotel.” Her Vault suit and bright smile were gone; instead she wore a slave harness, her back bent from five years of crushing servitude.

“ _Kill,_ ” Clint snarled.

Lucy’s screech resonated in Clint’s mind. “Die! Not again! _Die, Vault Dweller!_ ” As one, Clint and the mob surged forward. Sarah offered no resistance as the first blow landed, falling out of sight behind the wall of bodies. Clint threw himself into the mass, trying furiously to get to her, but she only lasted a moment against the onslaught. Arcade hauled Clint back, trying not to look at the bloody mess that used to be a person laying on the asphalt. 

“What’s wrong with you?” Arcade shouted at Lucy. “She didn’t do anything to you!” Lucy wasn’t listening, arms raised towards the Vault. The pavement cracked and bucked, and inch by inch the Vault tore itself free from the ground. Clint staggered back as the structure hovered overhead, rotating slowly. “Again, not possible,” Arcade said incredulously.

Lucy’s face was a mask out fury. She spread her arms wide and the Vault _separated_ , coming apart to reveal every railing, every Rolette wheel, every floor plate. In an instant the disassembled Vault exploded outward, individual pieces launching out towards the horizon. “Not dangerous now, Vault Dweller,” she hissed. “Not much without your honeyed words and nuclear fire.” With that she collapsed to the ground, her mob following an instant later.

Clint and Arcade stood alone in the silence, staring first at the newly formed hole in the ground and then at each other.

“Reckon that’s a mite different,” Clint allowed.

*

Lucy was unconscious well into the night. Over Arcade’s objections Clint began devising increasing lethal attempts to destroy her, first by stabbing, then shooting and finally resorting to packing Legion grenades around her body and setting them all off at once. Each time the injury lasted only as long as Clint kept his eyes on her; if he looked away or blinked Lucy looked as if she’d never been harmed at all. Being exploded didn’t appear to interrupt her sleep in the slightest.

“I have a theory,” Arcade said as Clint sat down heavily next to him.

“I hoped you might,” he replied, trying to think of a _more_ destructive way to kill Lucy. There weren’t many things that could survive a nuclear blast, but the contempt in her voice when she’d talked about “nuclear fire” made Clint think that if she did survive -and at this point he would be surprised if she didn’t- she would be extremely upset, specifically at him.

“Either what we’re perceiving as her body isn’t real at all, or it’s not actually necessary for her being alive. Either way, she appears to be beyond harm from physical trauma.”

Clint gave the other man a long look. “If I hadn’t just seen what I’ve seen, I’d say you were making up ghost stories to spook me.” Arcade just gestured at Lucy’s slumbering form. “Yeah. So we can’t kill her.”

“Not for lack of trying,” Arcade said drily. 

“So what do we do?”

“Um. Run like hell?” Arcade rose to his feet and began to pace. “NCR tried to get you to bring her to the Dam, as a weapon.”

“Cali knew enough to be scared out of his mind by her.”

“I think the NCR knew that whatever she is, she’s powerful. But they don’t know how to control her, so they just threw her at Caesar and bolted before she could get started. Might be a good example for us to follow.”

Clint shook his head. “A weapon without a focus is no good for anyone,” he mused. 

Arcade frowned at him. “What are you thinking?”

“That I still have a delivery to make.”

Lucy lurched awake with a gasp. “There’s a girl!”

“A girl?” Arcade asked. Clint realized he was beginning to take Lucy’s oddities worryingly in stride.

“A girl,” Lucy nodded. “She’s scared because her mother went to Africa and was due back hours ago but she doesn’t know that her mother _murdered_ her mother and now she’s lost up in orbit.”

“It’s all right, that wasn’t real.” Arcade soothed. “You’re here, in New Vegas.”

Lucy stood, looking around herself uncertainly. “This…isn’t the Cathedral. Where’s Gideon?” She cocked her head to the side, staring off at nothing. “Oh! There you all are.”

“Lucy,” Clint intoned. “Why did you destroy Vault 21?”

She turned towards him, an expression of surprise that she had to explain anything at all. “The Vault Dweller, and her nuclear fire. She came with sweet words, words for all of us, but she only wanted to trick us.” She smiled, lips twitching and horrible. “Kill the Vault Dweller first. Then she can’t hurt anyone.”

Clint glanced back at Arcade, who shrugged. He could feel the weight of her words impress into his brain. _Kill the Vault Dweller first._ “Well, you certainly managed that. And I do understand that some people need to get theirs.” 

“I’m just…” Tears abruptly came to Lucy’s eyes. “I’m sorry, Clint. For what’s going to happen to you. It’s not her, she doesn’t deserve it! She’s just trying to make the world a better place.”

“You’re not making sense,” Clint answered quietly. “And I think I’d rather you kept on with that.”

Lucy’s tone shifted, and the tears disappeared like they never were. “I want to see the Master’s Army.”

“The…the super mutants?” Arcade asked. “That might be a problem.”

“Legate Lanius made sport of hunting them all down before he moved west,” Clint explained. “I only know about one super mutant left in the Mojave.”

“Then we know where we’re going,” Lucy replied, locking her gaze on him. “You’ll come with me. The others…” she gestured to the mob of Legion soldiers and slaves, still laying where they fell hours before, “they’ve been filled by me, and I…am confused. At times. You are not confused, and not filled by me because you are broken. You will join me.”

Clint opened his mouth to argue, and in that instant the facade of a woman disappeared, revealing the twisted, dark mutant underneath. “All right. And then we’ll…Caesar…” All thoughts of disagreement fled. “All right, we’ll go.”

*

Five years ago, Jacobstown had been a safe retreat for the super mutants of the Mojave Wasteland, a place where they could go to try and control their bestial nature. That only lasted as long as the Legion stayed east of the Colorado River. 

Marcus tried to keep the retreat neutral, but the Legate had none of it. He refused to advance to the west without having completely secured the Mojave, and that meant wiping out every holdout of resistance. He’d personally led the Legion in the assault against the super mutants, relishing the rare opportunity to match himself against their strength. That he’d never had a chance to pay the Legate back for the massacre here was one of Clint’s few regrets.

“Why do you care about the super mutants?” Arcade asked as they trudged up the path into the mountains. 

“It’s our differences that divide us,” Lucy replied. Clint wiped sweat off his brow, throwing an irritated glare at her feet as she floated several inches over the dirt. “If we are all unified, all one, there will be no differences. No need to war. Some disagree. The super mutants were for them.”

Clint scoffed. “Peace by overwhelming force?”

“One last war before peace. Remove the inequalities of society, start anew.”

“Sound like a fellow I knew once,” Clint said. “Bird-dogging me for months, crying about some nation that never was. Always going on about Bears and Bulls and Old World symbols.”

“Yes, and you killed Ulysses, didn’t you?” Lucy smiled. “A man attempting to improve the world in his own twisted way, and you killed him not because of the danger he posed to others, but because he crossed you.” 

Her knowing look nettled him, and for a moment Clint forgot his dread. “You seem to know an awful lot for someone been living in a box the past hundred-odd years.”

They crested the last rise and Jacobstown came into view. Before the war it had been a lodge of some sort, but age and the Legion’s onslaught had left it little more than a skeleton of its former self. Half of the building was collapsed in on itself, though Clint suspected that might have had more to do with the super mutant’s zealous use of explosives in defending their home than the Legion itself. “Been a while. Not half long enough. Come on, let’s get this over wi-”

His words were cut off abruptly as fat fingers constricted around his throat. “You don’t belong here, dearie!”

“ _Lily! Wait!_ ” He gasped, but the super mutant’s strength was overwhelming. 

“Sorry sweetness, but Leo’s right about this. No visitors.” Darkness stained Clint’s vision even as Arcade scrabbled at Lily’s fingers, trying to pull them free. 

“Lily? Lily Bowen?”

The pressure around his throat released and Clint collapsed to the ground. Lily loomed over him, a mountain of blue muscle wrapped in an old lady’s gardening clothing. “Well, as I live and breathe. I haven’t seen you since…well, how long’s it been, Lucy?”

“I don’t know. When was the last time you were at the Cathedral?”

“Of course they’re good friends,” Clint growled as Arcade helped him to his feet. 

“It actually makes sense,” Arcade said. “Lily was in the Master’s army, and Lucy was apparently also involved somehow.”

“Lily’s _insane,_ ” Clint snapped.

Arcade shrugged. “Yes, so they have that in common too.”

“Where are the others, Lily?” Lucy asked, glancing around the ruined grounds of Jacobstown. “The super mutants had…a purpose. Enforce the Master’s will.”

“Oh…such a troubling subject, dearie.” Lily adjusted her ragged straw hat. “Maybe we should chat over a nice tea. And I’m sure Clint would like to see his lady friend.”

Lucy’s tone became steel. “Answer me.”

Lily sighed. “Well, we did, dearie. But after the Master died, we had to find something else to do.”

“The Master is…?” Confusion, fear, rage and realization crossed Lucy’s expression in quick succession. “No, I knew that. The Vault Dweller.”

 _Kill the Vault Dweller first_ echoed in Clint’s mind. “I’ll let you ladies catch up,” He said, eyeing the staircase. He didn’t want to go upstairs, but it would have been rude to pretend she wasn’t here.

_”You don’t want to talk to me, Gloria?” Cass snarled, shoving the barrel of her rifle into the other woman’s gut. “Seems to me you and yours have been causing mine no end of trouble. I’m here to see an end to that.”_

_Clint checked the back room, but none of the Van Graff bodyguards were hiding; they’d all come out and met their deaths head-on. He made his way back to the Silver Rush’s showroom, stepping over Jean-Baptiste to collect the microfusion cells lining the shelves._

_“Half-tribal bitch tries to play with the big families,” Gloria spat through broken teeth. “What did you think was going to happen, Cassidy?”_

_“Figured you’d have the spine to come at me square. It’s what I’d do. Got your brother’s corpse and those of all your thugs to prove it.”_

_The tri-beam rifle caught Clint’s eye, and he hefted its weight. Looked like a normal laser rifle but for the emitter at the end, might be worth keeping around for close fights. He heard a faint sound, a _clink_ of metal hitting wood floor and turned in time to see Jean-Baptiste lurch his arm forward, clumsily launching a plasma grenade towards Cass in one last show of contempt._

There weren’t many places that were safe for free women in the Legion’s Mojave, given that the Legion as a whole believed that a woman’s place was in chains. There were even fewer havens for a woman who fought to keep the Legion east of the Colorado. When Lily offered to watch over Cass, Clint had agreed. The empty remains of Jacobstown were out of the Legion’s attention; it was a safe place to recuperate.

Clint pushed open the door to the first room off of the stairs. Cass sat next to the window, in just the same spot she’d sat when he visited a year or two before. “How’re you doing, Cass?”

“The Van Graffs still dead?”

“The ones in New Vegas, yeah.” Clint glanced around the room. Empty Med-X syringes cluttered the far corner, and he spied more than a few Jet inhalers stashed where absent-minded Lily wouldn’t notice. 

No one who had seen a plasma weapon in action would ever forget that they could reduce a person to a puddle of glowing slime. What most people didn’t know was that sometimes the plasma burst wasn’t quite up to liquefying a body; Arcade called it ‘partial destabilization of the molecular matrix.’ Cass turned her face to him, revealing the right side of her body, flesh smeared and melted. Her arm and leg lay uselessly, the muscle and skin deformed past any hope of moving. “Then I’m doing just fine.”

Clint sat on the edge of the bed, forcing himself to meet Cass’ eyes, whole and warped both. “Got something I wanted your perspective on.”

“You shouldn’t have let Arcade walk away,” she replied immediately. “You were stupid in love with him, even if you’re too damn stubborn admit it.” It was exactly the same thing she said last time he’d come, and the time before. Truth to tell, it was a large part of why he’d stopped coming back.

“Appreciate the input. Not the advice I’m looking for.” Clint wiped his hands on his pants. They were clean, he could see, but he always felt like he had something on them when he talked to Cass. “Got me a weapon, a bona fide doomsday weapon. Half a mind to take it out and have a conversation with Caesar himself.”

“What’s the holdup?”

“Afraid, I guess.” 

Cass laughed, a short, brutal bark of a sound. “You? Courier Six, the man who came back from the dead, who beat the Divide, who kicked off the Grand Clusterfuck? You’re scared?”

“Weapons this big tend to be real hard to aim proper.”

“You sound like Veronica and Arcade,” Cass said. “Going on about ‘proper application of technology.’ Everything’s got consequences, Clint. Deal with them as they come. Caesar’s had it coming for longer than either of us have known about him, and you’ve finally got a hammer big enough to do it. Make the fucker pay.”

Clint turned it over in his mind. “Thanks, Cass. Just needed to hear somebody say it out loud. It’s been…confusing, past few days.”

“It’s what I’m here for,” she replied, turning back to the window. “Why’s Lily talking to a corpse on the front lawn?”

“That’s part of the confusing.” Clint stood. “I’ll be back through when I can. Might be a bit.”

“Wait.” Cass struggled in her seat to see him go. “Wait. Clint, have you…have you heard from Veronica and Boone recently?”

Clint pursed his lips. This here was the other part of why he’d stopped coming back. “Yeah, Cass. Boone’s still holed up in Novac, sniping any Legion who get close. Got himself a good woman and a passel of little ones. Talked with Veronica just last week. Think her and that Follower of the Apocalypse doctor really hit it off, she picked a dress up at one of the less reputable stores in Freeside. She was even talking about letting her hair down.”

“Goodness,” Cass said, a smirk creasing half of her face. “Somebody’s looking to score, isn’t she?”

“Yeah,” Clint nodded sadly. “Yeah. See you, Cass.”

He made his way back downstairs and outside. Lucy and Lily were chatting and ignoring Arcade as he danced around them, checking Lily over. “Oh, Clint. Leo wanted me to ask you if you might have anything he can do to help out.”

“She’s been out of medications for more than a year now,” Arcade warned.

“Been talking with Leo a lot recently?” Clint asked.

“Oh, he’s been coming around. More and more. But don’t you worry, I’d never let him near our Cassidy.”

“Glad to hear it,” Clint said. “Lucy, can I talk with you?” She followed him a ways away from the lodge. With each step he took his mind screeched at him to _run_ , to _get away from the thing_ , but he held firm. The fear in him warred with the frustration and impotent fury he’d lived with for nigh on five years now, and finally the fear was losing ground. “You get what you wanted from Lily?”

She nodded contently. “I believe so. The Master’s Army is broken, but it doesn’t matter. Every day more are made in Mariposa, and before long we’ll have a force that Vault City, New Reno and the Hub will be powerless to resist.”

“Right. About that. You know that you’re in Nevada now, not California?”

Confusion marred her features. “I…yes. New Vegas.”

“Yes. New Vegas. New Vegas, that’s ruled by Caesar’s Legion. The same Legion that wiped out the last of your super mutants here. Do you want to get back at them? To make them pay for what they’ve done?”

Lucy’s head cocked to the side. “You seek to manipulate me.” Clint held his ground as she examined him. “You know I can see your thoughts, don’t you? The hole in your mind doesn’t prevent that. You desire for me to destroy your enemies.”

“ _Yes_ ,” Clint snapped. “Because some bastards need killing. All those people in New Vegas? Caesar tried to…to prevent them from unifying, like you talked about before. As long as he lives, he’ll always stand against you and what your Master want.”

“You will regret this,” she intoned, watching his face.

“No ma’am.” Clint offered his hand. Lucy took it, her skin cold and subtly wrong. “Only if we fail.”

“What’s going on?” Arcade asked, looking back and forth between them, panic building in his voice. “What happened?”

Clint restrained a smile. “We’re moving out.”

Arcade blanched, looking from Clint to Lucy. “We’re what? To where?”

“East. To the Dam.” This time Clint allowed a cruel grin. “We’re going to kill Caesar.”


	3. Dead Man Walking

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> "I'd be careful - psykers show some pretty over-the-top mutations that could take the world to [Childhood's End](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Childhood%27s_End) faster than you can say 'uh, his eyes are glowing?'"
> 
> -Chris Avellone

_“Hey. Hey Boone.”_

_“Yeah Raul.”_

_“You think maybe it might be time to take the sunglasses off? Don’t know if you can tell, but its night time out now.”_

_Veronica laughed at that, striking a flint over the pile of kindling. “Come on now Raul, it’s how you know he’s suave and unconcerned.” The fire caught, and Arcade and Lily leaned cans of beans against the burning logs._

_Boone’s expression was unreadable, but Clint could hear faint amusement in his voice. “There’s something to be said for an ominous demeanor,” he allowed._

_“I’ve been thinking,” Veronica said. “With all the traipsing across the Mojave we do? We ought to start our own caravan. Arcade can handle the logistics, Raul and I can make sure things keep running, Boone can protect us with his fearsome glare…”_

_Clint laughed at that, scooting over on the log he sat on to make space for Arcade. Across the firepit Cass chuckled as she thrust her speared iguana into the flames. “I don’t know, Veronica. A caravan’s a big responsibility. You sure you’re up to it?_

_“I was in a caravan once,” Lucy commented, staring up at the stars. “It was cramped. Confining.” Clint jolted upright, staring at her. She lay back on the ground, fingers intertwined behind her head, her bedroll tucked between Boone’s and Lily’s._

_“No,” Cass drawled, spinning the lizard lazily on its roasting stick. “A caravan’s about…freedom. Nothing over you but the clear open sky.”_

_“What do you think, Lucy?” Veronica asked. “What’s your job going to be in Veronica’s Freight Transport?” Arcade and Raul disagreed with that name, kicking off an argument over what to call it. Clint ignored it all._

_“You can’t be here,” he hissed at Lucy. “This was years ago. You weren’t here…how can you…?”_

_“I am here,” Lucy said, and gestured off to the distance. “There.” Again at the opposite horizon. “There as well. I think, therefore I am. Aren’t you?”_

_Cass stared at him over the blaze, the iguana engulfed in flames and charring on her stick. “Come on, Clint,” she said with a wry grin. “How would you know if you’d plain lost your mind, or if it was just another day in the Mojave?”_

He came to with a scream, fighting at his bed roll to get free. Arcade woke groggily next to him, fumbling for his weapon and casting about for danger. Clint’s hand clutched at his chest, his heart hammering at his ribs. Slowly, he looked to his left where he knew she would be. Just as she had in the dream she lay on her back, staring up at the sky. Slowly her head turned, eyes like empty voids meeting his. “It could be both,” she intoned.

*

It was a time after. In a different place. Clint knew that much.

Aurelius of Phoenix ran from them, screaming. His plumed helmet fell away, bouncing along in the dirt to rest at Clint’s feet. Lucy watched him go disinterestedly, the smoking remains of his entourage scattered around her. “Shouldn’t you stop him?” Clint asked.

Lucy ignored him, floating slowly eastward. Behind her Arcade picked through the corpses. “She makes a hell of a weapon,” he said. 

“That she does.” Clint began to follow her, but Arcade caught his arm. 

“This is insane. It’s not _worth_ it. Believe me, I have no doubt she’ll kill whoever you want, but…” His voice trailed off. “I don’t know what day it is anymore. It’s like we keep…skipping?” Arcade’s grip spasmed. “I’m scared, Clint. I think…I think she forgets about us. And we stop _being_ until she remembers.”

Clint shook him off. “We get her pointed at the Dam. We let her do her thing. We deal with the consequences after.”

“See? That. That right there.” Arcade stalked a few paces away, then turned back, furious. “ _That_ is why war never changes. Because there will always be people like you ready to retaliate, to escalate. To make things worse.”

“What do you want me to do, Arcade?” Clint shouted back. “I’ve sat back and done nothing for five years now. Watched Caesar and his damned Legion rape and massacre their way across the Mojave and did nothing. And nothing’s come of it. This ‘peaceful coexistence’ you talk about _doesn’t work_ if the other half wants you dead or enslaved. So I aim to get rid of that other half.”

“Even if you have to tear down society to do it?” Arcade asked. “Don’t like the Chairmen for crossing you? Kill them all. Don’t like the Omertas for the whoring? Kill them all. Don’t like the cannibals over at the Ultralux? Kill them all. Don’t like the Van Graffs and Alice McLafferty and Powder Gangers and the Khans and _Mr. House_? _Kill them all._ And what did that get you?”

Clint glared. “Bunch of people who needed killing being dead.”

“Yeah.” Arcade shook his head. “Yeah. It was just grand.”

*

“Are we still headed for the Dam?”

It took a few seconds for Clint to recognize where they were; Cottonwood Cove, once the Legion’s beachhead on the west bank of the Colorado River. Lucy stood in the shallows of the river, marveling at the water lapping around her ankles. 

“Weren’t we…” Arcade glanced around, glancing upriver at the dam. “A little while ago the dam was miles _east_ of us. Now it’s miles _north_ of us.”

“Just another spot of weirdness,” Clint said, “so long as we’re still going where we ought to be.”

“There’s something they want us to see,” Lucy said, stepping onto the shore. She wandered up the footpath towards the road proper, leaving Clint and Arcade to follow behind. 

Arcade spotted it first; a column of smoke, rising up from the north. Lucy made her way towards it, half-walking and half-gliding. “Smells like a barbeque,” Clint scowled. They mounted a rise and Clint got a clear look; a squad of Legion soldiers had worked over the ruins of what had five years ago been Ranger Station Echo. A massive brazier had been erected and two entire Brahmin lay roasting in the flames. “Well this is something new.”

One of the soldiers, a centurion by his armor, stepped forward and shouted across the distance. “Hail! I bring you welcome on behalf of the Son of Mars, great Poena!”

Clint glanced at Arcade. “He talking to us?”

“No, Lucy. Poena was a Roman goddess. Caesar is trying to fit her into the framework of the Cult of Mars.”

“Why?”

Arcade shrugged. “Because the alternative is admitting that there’s a nigh-omnipotent entity wandering around his backyard that he can’t do anything about at all?”

“Huh,” Clint grunted. “Wise man.”

The centurion approached, his entourage in formation behind him, and Clint struggled to pull the man’s name from his memory, but nothing came. Another one of the countless Legion soldiers Clint had seen over the past several years. He was obviously frightened, but whatever sense of loyalty or duty he had drove him to speak. “The great Caesar offers you this tribute,” he said to Lucy. “Come, feast with us. We’ve many things to discuss.”

“You…again?” Lucy asked, confusion written plain on her face. 

“Ah…” The centurion saluted, right fist thumping against his breastplate. “I am Aurelius, of Phoenix. Caesar regrets that he is unable to meet you divinity personally, but hopes that you will consent to speak with him in person.”

“Caesar…” Lucy mused. “Does he still wear a crown of leaves?”

“I don’t…” Aurelius glanced at Clint, uncertainly. “What do you mean?”

“I had a crown, once.” Lucy reached up, fingertips brushing against the arc of silver that appeared across her brow. “It was _beautiful_ , and quiet.” 

The dirt underfoot _shifted_ , becoming metal plating; the Mojave was gone, replaced by a dark, dirty room. “Looks Vault-Tec,” Arcade muttered. The Legion soldiers rumbled uncertainly, readying weapons as a three people materialized in the middle of the room. 

“What is this?” Aurelius demanded, brandishing a gladius.

“An echo,” Arcade answered. “A memory.”

 _Lucy and the others milled aimlessly around the room. They looked human to Clint’s eye, but something was subtly_ wrong _about all of them that he just couldn’t put his finger on._

_“I almost have the solution to the environmental problems fucking this world over,” Lucy snarled. “But I can’t stop thinking about purple dinosaurs. Is this a problem?”_

_“Don’t ask me,” one of the new men muttered. Despite his ornate crown, Clint couldn’t help but feel that the man was a complete loser. “I’m tired of living.”_

_A door slide open, admitting a tall woman in a Vault-Tec blue and yellow jumpsuit. “Where the hell is Vault 13?” Clint murmured, reading the number on her back. “California?”_

_“Um…hello,” the woman said. She glanced from Lucy to each of the other three in turn, then to the sign hung on the wall: ‘Warning! Do not Disturb!’ “I wondered if you could help me. I need to speak to the Master.”_

_“The Master!” Lucy exclaimed. “The Master loves speaking! You can’t believe how happy this makes me. I think I’m going to go punch the wall for a while.” She lashed out at the wall with a cheerful grin, driving her fists over and over into the unforgiving metal._

_The Vault woman watched her warily. “Well…I heard that there was something special that had to be done in order to speak with the Master.”_

_Another man spoke up, draped in scruffy clothes and an aura of palpable violence. “Only the powerful can pass, but they will be kept from passing. The asphalt will run red!”_

_“_ How _can the powerful pass?” The Vault woman demanded. Her patience was clearly running thin._

_“Gideon…Gideon speaks the way,” was all he answered._

_“Gideon, yes!” Lucy cried. Her fists and the wall before her were smeared with her own blood. “I agree. Completely and utterly. You’re right…!” A confused look passed across her face. “What did you say? Oh, never you mind.”_

_“The walls are alive with those who have gone before,” the last one, Gideon spoke up. “Meeting of the soul…melded, to protect the Master of all.”_

_Clint took a good look at the Vault woman. She looked weary more than anything, like a woman who had seen the worst the Wasteland had to offer and still something drove her on. It was the same look as was in Aurelius’ eyes: desperate duty. “You don’t have to be afraid of me,” she said quietly. “I want to speak with the Master because I want to join him. Your cause is so…it’s noble. This world is horrible, and the Master might be the only one who can make it better. Even better than it was before the Great War.” Gideon was quiet, and the woman gestured around. “I’ve dwelled in a Vault for most of my life. I know how important it is to keep the Vault safe. Above all else. I want to help.”_

_“I will anoint you,” Gideon replied. “I will give what I must not.” He touched the crown on his head, and produced another for the Vault woman._

_“A psychic nullifier? Of course, to keep the Master’s influence from my mind.” The Vault woman carefully set the crown on her head. “It helps keep you in check, doesn’t it? Your…your powers?”_

_Lucy had given up on punching the wall and was staring at the other woman’s shoes with a detached fascination. “No power in the universe could stop us without them.”_

_“Thank you,” the Vault woman said, backing away to the door. “For the nullifier. I’m sorry to disturb you. Goodbye.”_

_The door slid shut behind her, and the scruffy-looking man shivered all over. “Was there someone here? Just now?”_

_“Yes, from a Vault,” Lucy replied. “But she left.”_

_“She’s a hero,” Gideon agreed. “That’s why she had to leave.”_

_The room bucked under them, driving everyone to the floor. Clint felt something inside him suddenly go missing. Lucy and the others looked to each other in abject horror. “The Master,” Gideon whispered. “I can’t feel the Master.”_

_“No, no nononono,” Lucy whimpered. “Not again. There’s no place like home, there’s no place like home, there’s no place like home…”_

_Clint felt the shockwave approach, and it blasted through them with all the might and devastation of the Old World apocalypse come again to the Wasteland._ The dirty room blasted apart, walls flying to the distance and Clint found himself flat on his back in the Mojave dirt, staring up at a massive mushroom cloud roiling overhead. Lucy held up her hands to ward off the nuclear fire, screeching even as her skin blackened: “ _VAULT DWELLER!_ ”

 _Kill the Vault Dweller first,_ flashed through Clint’s mind as the fire washed over him.

It was gone in an instant. Clint and Arcade sat up slowly, wary of the massive crater torn out of the ground where the Legion’s offering had roasted. Most of the soldiers lay scorched and dead, and Aurelius gaped at the devastation around them. For her part, Lucy sat with her knees drawn up to her chest, staring out at the ground blasted glass-smooth. “There’s no place like home. When can we go home, Clint?”

“Was that…real?” Aurelius gasped.

Clint brushed himself off. “As long as she wants it to be, I reckon.”

“No,” Aurelius backed away, eyes wide with panic. He ran from them, screaming. His plumed helmet fell away, bouncing along in the dirt to rest at Clint’s feet. Lucy watched him go disinterestedly, the smoking remains of his squad scattered around her. 

She looked over to Clint. “You’re right,” she said. With a gesture Aurelius began to disintegrate, fading away into mist. Lucy floated upright, and began wandering away to the north.

“…what just happened?” Clint asked.

“She just _sublimated_ a man,” Arcade said, looking at the still-smoking bodies of the Legion soldiers. “And I think she may have just created a nuclear detonation with her _mind_.”

“Damn impressive,” Clint allowed, turning to follow Lucy.

“Impressive?” Arcade started after him. “Clint, she’s getting worse. Her sense of what _is_ is intruding on…on reality. The more she acts out, the worse it gets. I’ve heard the legends of the Vault Dweller from Arroyo; what we just saw happened more than a hundred years ago. Maybe it’d be a good idea for all our sakes if she let go of all that hate, before she flashes back again and accidently cracks the earth open.”

“Sometimes that hate is all that keeps you going,” Clint retorted. “It’s certainly kept me purposeful.”

*

“ _Courier. I’m glad you’re here._ ”

The approach to Hoover Dam lay before them. Lucy rotated slowly in the air, speaking quietly to herself about ghosts and clouds. Clint ran a hand through his short-cut hair, trying to separate the now from five years ago. It was becoming harder, the longer he was around her. “The Legion will be well dug in, and probably waiting for us. We can expect-” 

_“…entrenched positions, emplacement weapons and what artillery we can bring to bear.” General Oliver leaned over a map of the Mojave. Clint noticed that the eastern half of the map was drenched with the red tokens of Legion units, while the west side was much more sparsely populated with NCR units. Behind him, Veronica and Boone shifted uncomfortably as they worked out the odds of fending off all the legionaries that the map implied. “I’m not going to lie to you, son. I don’t know that we can stop the power that the Legion can bring down on our heads here. We’ll bloody them, but without a miracle the Dam is going to belong to Caesar by tomorrow. I’ve heard that you’re a man who can make things happen. Can you bring me that miracle?”_

Lucy made her way towards the Dam. A few soldiers opened fire on her, out of bravery or stupidity, only to find their bullets warping around her form. She ignored them entirely, wandering down the wide path spanning the top of the Dam. Clint and Arcade followed a safe distance behind, whatever ‘safe’ meant; the shadows began to take on an uncertain shade of green, and to Clint’s eye the corners of the square slabs of concrete under their feet had somehow stopped meeting at right angles. Lucy’s _wrongness_ was spreading.

The view to the south caught her eye, and she leaned over the precipitous drop to stare down at the waters below. The Legion mistook Lucy’s inattention for vulnerability; centurions with whips drove a mob of slaves at her as a distraction while other legionaries wasted ammunition trying to wound her.

“These are _slaves_ , Clint!” Arcade wheedled. “They’re no more Legion than you or I!”

Clint was unmoved, even as the first wave of slaves staggered away from Lucy, clutching at their heads as their minds eroded inside their skulls. “They’re choosing to raise their weapons for Caesar.”

“She will kill everyone around her, without even noticing,” Arcade exclaimed. “Your revenge against Caesar is going to kill hundreds or thousands of people who have nothing to do with it! It’s madness! It’s-”

“ _…hopeless.” Veronica tossed a rock over the side of the dam. “Maybe we could defend the dam if we had…I don’t even know. A squad of power armored troopers? Air support? Whatever tricks Mr. House had hidden up his sleeve?”_

_“Mr. House and I had a debt to settle up. He’s not in the picture now.” Clint replied lowly._

_“Yeah, him and all his Securitrons,” Veronica said, staring hard at Clint. “There’s nothing left to defend this place but the ragged NCR garrison, the three of us, Raul and Lily. It’s not enough. We need to start thinking about what to do after the Dam falls.”_

_Boone shook his head. “Isn’t going to fall. Every legionary who sets foot on that dam gets a bullet.”_

_“Hidebound stupidity isn’t any more appealing from you guys than it is from my family,” Veronica shot back. “We can’t stop them! And_ when _they push through, we need a plan for getting everyone out. Arcade’s still in New Vegas with the Followers of the Apocalypse, Cass is holed up with the doctor in Goodspring…the Hidden Valley bunker! We need to warn them, figure out a way for them to evacuate safely!”_

_“Where exactly do you believe you’re going to find safety?” Boone drawled._

Screams drew Clint back to the present. Lucy had finally deigned to notice her attackers, walking among them and catching their eyes as she past. That glimpse into the darkness of her eyes was enough to reduce most to a gibbering mess on the ground. The ones with sense fled before her, racing for protection from Lucy and the bizarrely oblong sun stretching out overhead. Clint grabbed one of the soldiers by his armor, dragging the man up to his face. “Caesar! Where is Caesar?” The soldier tried to answer but couldn’t still the chattering of his teeth long enough to speak.

Arcade shook his head. “She isn’t going to stop, Clint. Look at her. Look around! She’s twisting reality around her and she doesn’t even realize she’s doing it! You have to reign her in, before…”

“Nothing before we find Caesar,” Clint snapped.

_He felt blood in his mouth as he hit the ground. Clint grunted as a legionary stomped down on his back, pinning him to the ground. Another body hit the ground next to him: General Oliver._

_“Hello, Courier.” Clint craned his neck up to see Caesar himself approach, resplendent in his armor and rich purple cloak. “And General. A well-fought, valiant defense. But surely you understood the futility of it all, yes?”_

_“Go to hell,” Oliver spat. “You can kill me, but the Bear will wipe you and all your tribal fucks out.”_

_“Well.” Caesar considered for a moment. “You’re right about the first part.” At his gestured command three legionaries hauled Oliver to his feet, hoisting him over the edge of the dam. The general’s screams ended abruptly against the Dam’s sloping concrete wall._

_“And you, Courier.” Caesar crouched before Clint. “What reward are you due?”_

_“Just make it quick, you son of a bitch.”_

_Caesar laughed at that. “You won’t die. To the contrary! My frumentarii have followed your rampage across the Mojave with some interest. How you raged from one place to another, leaving a trail of devastation behind you.”_

_“Killed more than my share of your Roman re-enactors while I was at it,” Clint snarled. “I never sided with you.”_

_“Truly, you never declared your allegiance to me. But you have succeeded in fulfilling my desires better than the most loyal of my soldiers. New Vegas’ defenders, eliminated. The tribes that might have rallied against me, crippled. The victory this day would have been far more costly without your intervention.” Caesar placed a golden coin on the ground in front of Clint, a bull and some words of Latin carved into its face. “A token, of my favor.” To the soldiers: “Let him up. This man has served Caesar well, and will be rewarded with his freedom.”_

_Clint snatched the coin up,_ locking eyes with Caesar as he exited a stairwell and stepped onto the Dam’s walkway. “It seems there’s no avoiding Poena,” he said. He was dressed in the same armor and cloak as Clint remembered from five years ago, but his face was haggard and drawn tight with pain. “Perhaps it’s best to meet Jupiter’s judgment directly, then.”

“She’s not going to judge you,” Clint replied lowly, drawing a laser pistol from his holster. “Any last words?”

“Why are you even doing this?”

The words came from Arcade, rather than Caesar. “You even have to ask?” Clint whirled to face the other man. 

Arcade shrugged. “I think _you_ do.” His expression was one of sad disappointment, like he was waiting for Clint to understand. Even Lucy turned to focus on their conversation, the sun snapping back to its accustomed shape as her attention focused.

“Who are you talking to?” Caesar asked, looking back and forth between Clint and Lucy.

Clint ignored him, screaming at Arcade. “Because he _needs to die_. For what he’s done to the Mojave, to New Vegas, to…to…” 

_The Legion wasted no time capitalizing on their victory at the Dam, and within hours had started the march to New Vegas itself. Clint sent Veronica and Boone to the Brotherhood bunker and Goodsprings, desperate to warn their friends even as he ran to New Vegas as fast as his wounds would allow him. The soldiers he passed jeered at him; word of Caesar’s favor had spread to the troops and none would impede him, but even they saw the humor of the profligate whose resistance served Caesar. Clint arrived several hours after the Legion, passing the shattered, pathetic remains of the King’s resistance at the outskirts of the city._

_Old Mormon Fort still stood, but its walls were now marked with bullet holes and blood. The Followers had fared as well against the Legion onslaught as Clint expected an organization of pacifist doctors would. Clint picked his way through the mess of collapsed tents and bodies left to rot in the dirt, looking for one in particular._

_He found Arcade sprawled over the corpse of a Freesider, a spear driven through both of them._

_Clint dropped to his knees, tears blurring his sight._ “Is that why Caesar needs to die?” Arcade asked, looking down at his own body. “For what he did to me?”

“Yes,” Clint sobbed. “Yes. Because of him, because of Caesar, you’re _gone_.”

Lucy floated over, brow knit in confusion as she studied Clint’s expression. “You’re right.” Arcade sat down in the dirt next to Clint, stroking his back. “And it was a horrible way to die. But all this? Baiting Lucy to greater and greater acts of destruction? It’s not going to bring me back. All of this is just acting out the endlessly reiterative cycle of conflict.” 

Clint shuddered. “And I’ve just made everything worse.”

“You…miss him,” Lucy ventured. “But he’s gone. He’s like the Master for you.”

Clint laughed at that, a harsh bark. “Something like that. Yes, something like that.” He looked around, but the only Arcade to be seen lay slain across the cot. “Did you…was he real?”

“You think, therefore he is,” she answered. 

“But it wasn’t actually him. Just a ghost of a memory.” Clint wiped his eyes and glanced across Old Mormon Fort to where Caesar stood. “Well. He always was a bit of a Jiminy Cricket. Lucy? Can you make all this go away? Back to the Dam?” The scene shifted in an instant and Arcade’s body disappeared along with the Fort. Clint took to his feet, and gestured at Caesar. “That man there? He’s the Vault Dweller to me. He’s caused me…pain…and I’ve wanted to hurt him so badly for so long. I wanted to keep hurting him until the pain in _me_ goes away.” 

Lucy looked between Clint and Caesar, light bending around her as she contemplated. “But you don’t want that now.”

“Oh, I do. I just…” Clint sighed. “Hurting him won’t make the pain go away. It won’t bring Arcade back. And I’m getting the feeling that for all your power, hurting the Vault Dweller wouldn’t bring your Master back either. Even if she were still alive.”

“I can create…facsimiles,” Lucy fretted. “Flawed. Improper.”

“Like Arcade, for me. The real Arcade wasn’t nearly so polite when it came to questions of ethics.” Lucy looked at him questioningly. “Maybe it’s human nature to avenge hurts. Maybe that’s why we don’t deserve peace. But you and me…maybe we can earn ourselves some peace. Maybe we can begin again.”

Lucy nodded. “The casino.”

“You and me. Trying to live with what we have, instead of with the emptiness of what we don’t.” Clint looked at the bare spot of concrete Arcade had vanished from. “Because that’s the hard part. Not the starting over, but…” He rubbed his face, tears wet against his skin. “But learning to let go.”

*

_And so it came to pass that the Courier returned to the Sierra Madre, with its promises and its ghosts. Lucy joined him, joyfully returning home to a place she had never been but remembered fondly. They lived there for some time, neither ever forgetting what had been taken from them but both learning to accept their losses. Eventually Lucy became able to distinguish between the reality she perceived and the reality those around her experienced, and in so doing began to develop a sense of balance and reason that the Master’s experiments had deprived her of more than a hundred years before. Clint began to measure his actions by their consequences, mindful of Arcade’s ‘endlessly reiterative cycle of conflict.’ Though he never calmed his temper entirely, Clint developed a sense of peace that had eluded him since before he found himself on his knees looking up at the barrel of Benny’s gun._

_Until one fateful day nearly a decade later when a radio crackled to life of its own accord, and reminded Clint of a phrase._

_An imperative of fury and sorrow._

_He left the Sierra Madre that day, and Lucy wept for what her wrath had inadvertently done to him in New Vegas, all those years ago._


End file.
